i am in the first few days following the death of my father. It is that unusual time between the death and the funeral – and mercifully, as he died in Northumberland, that period is counted in days rather than in the weeks it would be in the South-East. Days are characterised by a deep sense of tiredness and incapacity, the inability to remember if I have eaten, or if I have fed the cat.

All of this should be familiar territory. Like priests and ministers of all traditions, I have spent a great deal of time with bereaved people over the past 30 years. But – entirely predictably – it turns out to be impossible to use for myself the lessons I have learned in the service of others.